Sick of eBay? Try these alternative places to sell...

Yes, we need a new alternative to eBay! So glad I found this blog but where do we go from here.

I wanted to mention 2 other places that are not on here, Addoway and Bonanza, though they too are slower and don't generate as many sales. I spend seven days a week right now mostly selling on eBbay. I do everything right as eBay wants me to do and have almost always been a Top-Rated seller since I started. Well I had some buyer purchase 5 items from me on a combined invoice, and days later she still had not paid, so I sent her a very friendly reminder (it was right before Christmas) that if she wanted to receive her items in time for Christmas there was only a day left to pay, and that I would give a free priority upgrade on shipping for her since she bought so many items. She took the priority upgrade and then when she got the items gave me positive feedback but low star ratings on shipping- even though I gave her the free upgrade & everything. She must have been upset about the reminder message- but had I not reminded her she would not have gotten them in time for the holidays! So her low star ratings were basically a passive aggressive way to be mean to me for a reason I am not even sure of. I contacted her and she won't even reply- Well the thing is now, even though Ebay supposedly only counts feedback where there are multiple items being bought at once as one feedback score, they are counting all 5 of the low stars against me and taking away my Top-Rated seller status :( And the thing that gets me, she gave the lowest stars on the shipping- which is what is causing my TR to be taken away- and I gave her a FREE priority upgrade!!! The amount she paid was right about what it had costed me. I hate the fact that eBay treats their sellers this way and some idiot buyer like this can cause all kinds of hard work to almost be for nothing. eBay is now going to double my fees which are already hundreds of dollars a month for who knows how long :( 4 of the items I actually had given her free shipping on, I only charged the base priority rate and no per item charge, but since it's combined eBay won't take that into consideration either! It's just not right. So basically this is my warning to anyone who is THINKING about trying to sell on eBay- Don't do it! Don't get yourself sucked into it... I am sucked into it now and it's too late. Try other alternatives. There is way more bad than good. I am now thinking of ways I can try to break away from them, but it's easier said than done...

This blog has been an eye-opener. Thanks for all the information. I'll re-think where I want to list and buy in the future.

I've been buying and selling on eBay for well over 12 years, with well over 20,000 transactions as a seller, and over 13,000 as a buyer (for resale purposes), and I can tell you firsthand that the deck is stacked in eBay's favor, as well as for the buyer. eBay doesn't care about it's sellers anymore. They stopped caring years ago. Plus the fees make it tough to make any money unless you are specialized. Craigslist is ideal for day-to-day stuff. I've bought and sold a bunch there too. Until just recently I had a 100% positive FB rating too, but some idiot decided to ruin that, and refused to revise the FB, even after I offered a refund. I'm working four jobs, seven days a week, 12+ hours a day; have been for some time since my wife (now ex-wife) left, and rely upon my reputation and the 'net to pay my bills and keep my house out of foreclosure. Quite a few around me have gone down too; it's tough to make it these days. Can't get a refi because of the property value decline, so I'm stuck with a high-interest rate, thanks to no fault of mine. eBay doesn't make things easier with it's selling policies either. They banned some items that I used to be able to sell there. At least I was able to buy my parents a new place to live, as theirs was falling apart, literally. Guess the hard work and long hours is worth it, but I am looking for other venues, as I too am sick of eBay!

Glad I stumbled upon this site. Thanks to everyone for all the alternative sites listed.

I have items I've wanted to sell (Christmas, mostly) and kept putting off setting them up on eBay.

I despise PayPal and do NOT want to open another account with them. I'd be interested in any comments from experienced sellers who have succeeded in selling online without using PayPal.

Thanks again.

I've been a seller/buyer on eBay for 5 years and they suspended my account because they say the product I'm selling is fake even thought i stated in the item description that it is not guaranteed real.

My Ebay store, CaratLuxe, was scheduled to have a big holiday sale starting today. When I started listing items (in the same category I have always sold in, fine jewelry) I was flagged for "suspicious activity." I only have one negative seller feedback recently because I had a family emergency and couldn't ship so I refunded the seller, but they left negative feedback. I also had a past negative feedback for stupidly taking a gamble and not shipping with tracking information. They said they never got the item, and I'll take that negative due to my own stupidity and write it off as a lesson learned. Otherwise, I have a few years track record with Ebay of excellent seller feedback and customer satisfaction, but now due to my "suspicious activity" and "being a threat to the Ebay community" I am banned from selling indefinitely.

I am a full-time student and new stay at home mom and full-time caregiver to a father with dementia and several other health issues. Having a "real" job at this point in my life is just not practical. Plus, I love my business. I created it, I have been successful and gained a loyal customer base, and I enjoy what I do. But a corporate giant like eBay decided to rip my little business out from under me. I put my hard work, time, energy, and money in to it, and they took away my only source of income at a whim, with no legitimate explanation. I never wanted to be part of eBay anyway - I've heard of other sellers having similar issues, and fully support small businesses with fair practices, not monopolies like eBay. But it seemed like there was no where else to go with the traffic needed for successful sales. I plan on joining YARDSELLR.com right now and continuing business as planned. eBay, this has only been a small bump in the road for my business. I won't let you take even a full day away from me, I'll just continue and do my best elsewhere and hope for the best. My business practices will speak for themselves, and you will eventually lose all of your sellers (which you seem to forget are truly the backbone of your company and support you through the increasingly ridiculous fees you and your partner in crime, PayPal, take from people).

Please look for my large selection of fine diamond jewelry coming within the next 24 hours! CaratLuxe has always offered fine jewelry at fair prices, and now the biggest sale ever is here in time for the holidays! If you don't see anything you like or need help, visit www.caratluxe.com for more items, diamond buying guides and resources, and my FREE personal jewelry shopping service! Happy Holidays!

I agree with all the negative comments about eBay. In the beginning it was good until eBay sided with the scammers. Amazon is run by a bunch of hard nosed idiots. My ratings on both sites are 99.8%

I've done well over 20,000 transaction on eBay and due to unscrupulous competition they convinced eBay to restrict then suspend my account. It hurt but I'm getting back on my feet. Amazon was making well over $1200 per month in sales fees from my hard work. One got my account suspended indefinitely and kept my product. Never again will I deal with Amazon. I have my own web store independent of the sites... slow but there's movement. I'm in it for the long haul.

Ebay will become what General motors and Blackberry have become..... too big to care!

Enough of them.

I have sold on eBay for over 10 years too. They removed the ability to leave negative feedback for buyers so now buyers win, then leave negative feedback, and there is nothing we as sellers can do about it. One buyer didn't read the description... clearly stated on page, they left negative feedback, I fully refunded money and she kept item for free and still left negative feedback! They restricted my account due to buyers complain about paying shipping,,, I never over charged shipping. On one PayPal did not confirm payment so they suggested not to ship until cleared, now buyer complained about that too so I am now restricted, I called e-bay... a BIG guess what... They don't care. Shame on eBay, they got too big to care!

Another alternative for classified trucks and truck parts is Trucker To Trucker http://www.truckertotrucker.com - seeking out niche sites like Trucker To Trucker helps to build a diverse and competitive market place (good for all of us, esp those who are sick of eBay!)
Thanks for the other suggestions, a couple of corkers there.

I hate eBay sooo much. They are so rude and I also have no explanation as to why I am suspended. I wish that its competitors would up there game and knock eBay off its perch! I know that if I had the money I would do everything possible to do that!

Thanks for the nice list with good explanation. This is one more website where selling of products are totally free. http://framt.com/sell-your-stuff

All the listed alternatives appear to be created by the same people. I would not buy off of any of them.
Easily the best, most professional share, buy and sell site on the net is notemote.com. There are so many reasons for this comment. Suffice it to say within no time of becoming a member you will be registered on all the major search engines so buyers can contact you to not purchase your goods but also to purchase your services should you have any.

Thanks so much for sharing your nightmare stories ,i would share mine however nothing is new..they are all about the same as yours from phone calls to nasty buyers,to scammers..to stockers.Nothing e-bay will help the seller resolve a problem.100% positives and bronze power seller {big deal}..Like all of us we are piggy banks with a number and not faces..Im tired of rules ..21 days of hold on money..for no better reasons ..other than paypal gets interest..so if anything i feel like I'm not the only one...The only hope is that i will be following the other sellers to a better selling site..so if anything there is hope ..we are still good sellers..Shame on eBay..but when its all said and done..The ones who made eBay big..will be the ones who watch it fall....Thanks again for sharing.

I have tried many alternatives to eBay and guess what? I have never sold one thing off of them either! eBay is the only place I have ever sold an item and actually got a small profit. But of course their fees are killer and their hold will make you want to punch a hole in the wall!

Just got kicked off eBay after several years for no valid reason and hung up on when asking for a manager . Need a good alternative. I HATE what eBay has become. They don't get a crap about the seller anymore and allow the buyer to abuse the system..HELP!

You may want to look at atomicmall.com. I have my own store and traffic seems pretty reasonable. Time will tell. Good luck to all

Hi, I have been trying to sell an item on eBay. eBay says my item has sold but I have not received payment and the supposed buyer ignores my e mail for payment . eBay says just work it out with the buyer and wait for ten days then wait for a further five days. It's nothing but a joke, eBay still take their fee's but I have still got my my item unsold. Has any one know of a good selling sight where I will not get ripped off?

I have read these comments with great interest. I too have been both a buyer and seller on eBay for more than 10 years and have become less than happy with the changes instituted in 2011 and not looking forward to those spoke of coming next year.

I have checked out a few of the sites listed in the comments, many of which are no longer active. I did notice a few specific software backends on some of the sites.

One site I was surprised I diod not see listed was http://www.easybid.us/ Currently they offer free auctions as well as free store setup, with the possibility they may add a final value fee in the future once the traffic warrants it. (I happen to know the owners)

Only time will tell the fallout of all the changes, but I have seen many of the larger sellers reduce the total number of auctions and buy-it-now listings by 20 - 40% and some even more. If the largest of the sellers continue that trend, eBay will be forced to make changes that makes the smaller sellers happy or face such a reduction in profits they will have to reduce staff and overhead to such a degree that their falling consumer acceptance will suffer more than it has the last few years.

Good luck to all.

Rick

eBay is an auction site which became what it is today partly because of its feedback forum and because of the culture it used to foster. I still believe eBay was an amazing organisation delivering a quality product and believing in what it did years ago. And I still believe it is capable of bringing back the culture it use to drive years ago before it became a mega market-floated corporation as it is today.

What it has become today however, as I'm reading now, sounds like eBay is the mother of all online shopping solutions and people are getting more and more frustrated with some of eBay's corporate strategies. Decisions made mainly to please shareholders as opposed to customers.

Having the sole purpose of pleasing shareholders is not, I believe, what makes excellent companies, organizations built to last generations beyond their founders existence. If the people at the top are making decisions mainly to keep share price value rising, then I'm afraid it's where it might perhaps be causing the customers (the livelihood of eBay itself) the heartache.

eBay is big and needs a huge amount of energy and money to support itself, so maybe we should keep this in mind before judging the big Bay. Not forgetting it's also hard to please everyone, shareholders, sellers, buyers, employees, government agencies, etc and they yet still are the place to go if you need an item sold as an auction. If you think auction, you think eBay and that's where the power of eBay lays.

That said, if you think "Buy it now", you certainly don't think "eBay!" immediately, and that's potentially where there's space for a contender.

Amazon.com is doing great, the fees are, yes, not cheap, and you're unable to upload your own photos to describe the item. Etsy.com is amazing if you think "Handmade, vintage, magical photos, friendly customer base".

Bonanzle.com is friendly, cool, and has a very good following, they even got a CNN article written about them.

Amongst the other "Buy it now" and store fronts options you have out there, there's probably too many to list, I'd keep a close look at Bonanza.com (used to be called Bonanzle.com), Addoway.com, Yardsellr.com, Pandakoo.com, for all sorts Artfire.com and Etsy.com for handmade vintage stuff.

Addoway is a social marketplace. Quite cool and their founder seems genuine in trying to make it big.

Also heard of something meant to be live last May 2011, called SDUFF.com, but the site is still in development with no immediate feedback as to when it'll be live, if at all.

Pandakoo.com has no auctions, entirely free, no listing or fees, no selling fees, allowed to leave feedback on buyers and sellers, and premium account given to "nice people" only. Interesting concept. Where sellers are rewarded for being kind individuals.

I hope eBay the best regardless, I believe with time they'll eventually realize that being that big, means they've lost the community-feel that got them the audience in the first place, perhaps re-instating some of that original culture back within the company structure might bring back the eBay we use to know.

@ littleuglyeddy

What happened to you is the exact thing that happened to me on ebay. My customer was a seller of high-end sports and luxury cars and decided he wanted his money back for a $450 copy luxury phone that I sold him because he found it for few dollars cheaper.

I agreed to give him his money back if he returned the phone and not give me a negative feedback, but he decides to give me a negative feedback anyway, keep the phone and got a refund. Talk about hat-tricks.

I proved, without a doubt, to eBay that this customer was scamming me. I sent them dozens of emails that showed the customer mentioning exactly what he intended to do to jeopardize my eBay account, but they overlooked it, because he was giving them more profit from selling luxury cars than I was selling phones.

They allowed him to give me, not only one negative, but another one after he falsely complained about my service with the first phone. They over looked the fact that he purchased another phone just to have the opportunity to give me a second negative feedback with no intention to actually pay for the phone, right after falsely complaining about the first one.

I too have sold tons of items on eBay. I have just been removed because of the stars in my shipping costs. I do not overcharge for shipping. Due to the policies of eBay and Paypal I always put insurance and signature delivery confirmation on my items. It still costs me more than the actual charge. Of the last 438 items I sold, 6 people complained that the shipping was too high and my listings were removed and I am only allowed to buy now! I offered to send them the copies of the shipping receipts to prove that I was not overcharging for shipping. They said that it wouldn't matter as the buyers marks would remain. I said well why would they buy when they see what the cost is and that the confirmation and insurance are included and the cost is posted - not a surprise. It does not matter to them that the info they get from buyers is false! I have 100% positive feed back and am continually thanked for my quick shipping and responses - none of that mattered. I think that one of you who do this for a living should start a site like eBay and charge half of the money and everyone would be happy! Ebay can kiss my butt!

I have started doing Yardsellr. Free To list. Free final sells. It is the buyer that pays an extra fee. But with their Photons which is like an onlin Coupon, they can earn and then pay the original price. WIN WIN. But I do not see how Yardsellr will make it with those who cheat and get huge amounts of Photons. Check out Yardsellr. I have done pretty well on that.